Millet can be mixed cropped with grain legumes or the grain legume can preceed the millet in rotation.

In the later case the grain can help balance the ration or diet and increase the millet yield and quality.

An appropriate system of raised bed would have the millet in the cener and grain legume at the border.

A system of toasting the grain legume would avoid inhibitors and improve the animal ration or the food can be used for direct consumption

Thanks Dr. Paul Reed Hepperly for participating in the discussion.

Millet can be mixed cropped with grain legumes or the grain legume can precede the millet in rotation. In the later case the grain can help balance the ration or diet and increase the millet yield and quality. An appropriate system of raised bed would have the millet in the center and grain legume at the border. Millets being rain fed crops do not require standing water in their fields, so no need for big dams, forests going under reservoirs and elaborate canal systems to get water to the farms. Millets do not need any fertility enhancement or pesticides to grow well and yield a good harvest. The backbone of an integrated system is the herd of ruminants which graze a pasture to build up the soil. Eventually, sufficient soil organic matter builds up to the point where crops can be supported. Even though millet has a higher footprint, the grain is hardier and its use of water is far more efficient and thus sustainable in arid lands than wheat. Plus, millet's overall water footprint could be lowered by using farming techniques that use rainfall more efficiently. They constitute an important source of food and fodder for millions of resource-poor farmers and play a vital role in ecological and economic security of India. These millets are also known as "coarse cereals" or "cereals of the poor”. Millets are highly nutritious food crops which are hardy and are resilient to climate changes. Ironically over years, the area under these crops is declining owing to undue focus on monocropping systems and high input agriculture. Millet based bio diverse cropping systems are now practicing farming which is more resilient and eco-friendly, producing more quantities, more diverse and more nutritious food. Reestablishment of millets based farming system has increased crop diversity and has added to the food basket and restoration of traditional knowledge base which eroded along with degradation of crop diversity.